President Signs H.R. 4145 to Place Statue of Rosa Parks in U.S. Capitol
Room 350
Dwight D. Eisenhower Executive Office Building

10:33 A.M. EST

THE PRESIDENT: Welcome. Please be seated. Thank you all for being here.
Laura and I thank you for joining us on this special day.

Fifty years ago an African American woman named Rosa Parks helped set in
motion a national movement for equality and freedom when she refused a bus
driver's order to give her seat to a white man. The bill I'm about to sign
calls for a statue of Rosa Parks to be placed in the Capitol's National
Statuary Hall. (Applause.)

By placing her statue in the heart of the nation's Capitol, we commemorate
her work for a more perfect union, and we commit ourselves to continue to
struggle for justice for every American.

I'm honored the Secretary of State has joined us, as well as Secretary
Alphonso Jackson. I want to thank the bill sponsors, Jesse Jackson, Jr. --
I see you brought some of your family with you. (Laughter.) Senator John
Kerry, Senator Thad Cochran; Senator Dick Lugar joining us, as well.

I'm proud that Bruce Gordon is here. He's the President and CEO of the
NAACP. Thanks for joining us, Bruce. I want to thank all the civil rights
leaders who've joined us, as well. I particularly want to say thanks to
Elaine Steele, Representative of the Rosa Parks Institute.

It's great to see Dr. Dorothy Height, as well. Welcome, Dr. Height.
(Applause.) I want to thank all of Rosa Parks' family who have joined us as
well; you're kind to come.

Rosa Parks was a daughter of the South who worked as a seamstress at a
department store in a Montgomery, Alabama. On December 1, 1955, she
boarded a city bus. Under local and state law, African Americans had to
give up their seats if any white people were standing. But after a
lifetime of discrimination and a hard day's work, Rosa refused. As she
would later say, "I wasn't tired physically, or no more tired than I
usually was at the end of a working day ... No, the only tired I was, was
tired of giving in."

By refusing to give in, Rosa Parks showed that one candle can light the
darkness. Like so many institutionalized evils, segregation ultimately
depended on public accommodation. Like so many institutionalized evils,
once the ugliness of these laws was held up to the light, they could not
stand. Like so many institutionalized evils, these laws proved no match
for the power of an awakened conscience -- and as a result, the cruelty and
humiliation of the Jim Crow laws are now a thing of the past.

By refusing to give in, Rosa Parks helped inspire a nationwide effort for
equal justice under the law. When she refused to yield her seat, Mrs.
Parks was arrested, convicted of violating the segregation laws, and fined
$10, plus $4 dollars in court fees. Her arrest sparked a boycott of the
Montgomery bus lines by its black passengers, and the formation of a local
association of African-Americans led by a young preacher named Martin
Luther King, Junior. The boycott ended more than a year later, after the
Supreme Court struck down segregation on buses. What had begun as a simple
act of civil disobedience ended up galvanizing the modern movement for
civil rights.

By refusing to give in, Rosa Parks called America back to its founding
promise of equality and justice for everyone. When the police officer
boarded the bus and told the seamstress that he had to arrest her, he
explained that the law was the law. Rosa and the black ministers who
defended her invoked the Constitution and pointed to a higher law. Our
Declaration of Independence makes clear that the human right to dignity and
equality is not a grant of government -- it is a gift from the Author of
Life. (Applause.) And by holding our nation true to the words of its
founding document, Rosa Parks helped her fellow African-Americans claim
their God-given freedoms and made America a better place.

Eventually the civil rights movement would succeed in persuading Congress
to pass more sweeping legislation that dealt with voting rights and
discrimination in public places, and school segregation -- and the United
States Congress should renew the Voting Rights Act of 1965. (Applause.)

Dr. King liked to say that our Civil Rights Act was written in the streets
by the citizens who marched for justice and equality. And on this day we
remember the great inspiration this movement drew from the quiet courage
shown by an Alabama woman riding home on a Cleveland Avenue bus.

It is fitting that this American hero will now be honored with a monument
inside the most visible symbol of American democracy. We hope that
generations of Americans will remember what this brave woman did, and be
inspired to add their own contributions to the unfolding story of American
freedom for all.

And now it's my honor to sign the bill that will make Rosa Parks the first
African American woman to be honored with a statue in our nation's Capitol.
(Applause.)